Serious question re: HPS

Why do some healers seem to operate under this horrible delusion that high HPS means high survival rates for the raid?

I was grinding out my last few A1N's today and in one of them, I was asked to off-tank. So, as usual, I didn't bother turning Grit on, just using Unleash and the like to try and grab the adds as they spawned, while maintaining most of my dps targeted toward Faust.

First add spawns - I tab-target to it and hit it with a full combo of Power Slash. Third hit rips it off the healer. Healer pulls it back not two seconds later. I Unleash, get it back, it falls off again.

Granted, I wasn't in Grit, but I've had plenty of healers where no one dies or is ever even close to dead and I don't need more than an occasional Unleash (usually one or two per mob spawn) to hold them tight to me. The healer was pumping out over 3000 HPS.

I did it then on the next one as WHM, to see why they were healing so much. I told the SCH I'd solo-heal, they can keep Cleric on. Everyone survived, adds would hit me once or twice, I spent 90% of the time dpsing and did ~800 HPS, with the SCH's Eos pulling ~1100 (mainly due to Whispering Dawn).

So, I need to ask. Why do White Mages seem to have this horrible idea that if their GCD isn't spinning or the heals stop coming out, someone is gonna die? Why do White Mages think that they need Medica II flowing and they should be using Cure III in Faust!? Like, what prompts this?

Overhealing is definitely a bad thing, admittedly I did it a bit in my first A1s run (yesterday) but only because I knew I was with a skilled and experienced group.

Back in the early days of A4n, I had a co-healer tell me that my HPS was "Ok". They were the type to get Med II up the whole run and aggro all the adds and spam heals, I had a good laugh and never ran with them again.

The idea that you should always be doing something is not wrong, but a lot of healers don't want to admit that a lot of the time you can commit 10-15 seconds to DPS while your regens/fairy handle matters until needed. Heal spam is the result of someone operating in-between these ideals.

Of course if this was DF then it's entirely possible they just didn't trust you. It's hard to trust a random, especially if they're taking more damage than you anticipated, in which case it is very easy to over-compensate on the side of caution.

In regards Medica flowing, making sure everyone is covered by regens is the easy-man's guide to WHM--just stack and ignore. But as for Cure III in Faust... That's probably just someone being stupid.

To be honest, those first two adds in a1n, a healer should be soloing them anyway :).

But back on topic, i think dont healers who havent run end game raids in this game ever learn one of the classes most important aspects - mana:healing efficiency. Its absolutely needed in raids to manage mana theough efficient healing and minimise overhealing, however this is not needed in any other aspect in the game, hence the healers who believe highest hps is best healer, rather than whats true of most efficient healer with global cooldowns and mana whilst keeping people alive is best.

Well, personally I'd guess:

- The player isn't used to the encounter yet, and thus worries (perhaps too much) about HP levels. I suppose you could add distrust of the co-healer here, and general inexperience.
- The player is one of those guys who think that keeping HP bars full is the mark of a great healer, the costs be damned.

Medica II is a quick and easy way to add a buffer for those groups of those people. No targetting required, just position yourself and let them HoTs fly (I do find that Medica II spammers are exceedingly bad at Regen, for some reason). Though I do cringe when I see a White Mage that never uses Assize or Medica instead, constantly overwriting their own Medica II hots. Or keeping it up on a fight like Faust where the only non-tank damage is sloppy add pickups or accidental cleaves. :/

As for Cure III... maybe some people don't realize that even with the Overcure proc, Cure III still has worse MP efficiency than all other single target healing spells? :p

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Originally Posted by Raminax

Well, personally I'd guess:

- The player isn't used to the encounter yet, and thus worries (perhaps too much) about HP levels. I suppose you could add distrust of the co-healer here, and general inexperience.

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Add to that, a tank without grit doesn't necessarily increase trust to healer who comes out of dungeon content. Yes, you and we know it works but it might have screamed "squishy!" to that healer.

It's hard to say what prompts that. Personally I've over healed some on content I've never done before just to compensate for the unexpected but stuff I'm comfortable with I'll spend most of my spare time in cleric stance. If somebody is spamming heals pointlessly I put it down to inexperience like sometimes in a roulette I come across those who spam Medica II every 10 seconds. It is a useful tool but not always the best especially when it comes to a fight where adds are expected but sometimes they can be easily peeled anyway or just tanked by a Healer so it doesn't matter.

Faust normal though you shouldn't even need to throw a single heal until under 50% HP unless the DPS is really slow. Well unless you are super squishy and just take huge chunks of damage form the adds.